Prescribing practices of primary-care veterinary practitioners in dogs diagnosed with bacterial pyoderma

Concern has been raised regarding the potential contributions of veterinary antimicrobial use to increasing levels of resistance in bacteria critically important to human health. Canine pyoderma is a frequent, often recurrent diagnosis in pet dogs, usually attributable to secondary bacterial infection of the skin. Lesions can range in severity based on the location, total area and depth of tissue affected and antimicrobial therapy is recommended for resolution. This study aimed to describe patient signalment, disease characteristics and treatment prescribed in a large number of UK, primary-care canine pyoderma cases and to estimate pyoderma prevalence in the UK vet-visiting canine population

CMB Telescopes and Optical Systems

The cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB) is now firmly established as a fundamental and essential probe of the geometry, constituents, and birth of the Universe. The CMB is a potent observable because it can be measured with precision and accuracy. Just as importantly, theoretical models of the Universe can predict the characteristics of the CMB to high accuracy, and those predictions can be directly compared to observations. There are multiple aspects associated with making a precise measurement. In this review, we focus on optical components for the instrumentation used to measure the CMB polarization and temperature anisotropy. We begin with an overview of general considerations for CMB observations and discuss common concepts used in the community. We next consider a variety of alternatives available for a designer of a CMB telescope. Our discussion is guided by the ground and balloon-based instruments that have been implemented over the years. In the same vein, we compare the arc-minute resolution Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) and the South Pole Telescope (SPT). CMB interferometers are presented briefly. We conclude with a comparison of the four CMB satellites, Relikt, COBE, WMAP, and Planck, to demonstrate a remarkable evolution in design, sensitivity, resolution, and complexity over the past thirty years.Comment: To appear in: Planets, Stars and Stellar Systems (PSSS), Volume 1: Telescopes and Instrumentatio

The Cosmological Constant

This is a review of the physics and cosmology of the cosmological constant. Focusing on recent developments, I present a pedagogical overview of cosmology in the presence of a cosmological constant, observational constraints on its magnitude, and the physics of a small (and potentially nonzero) vacuum energy.Comment: 50 pages. Submitted to Living Reviews in Relativity (http://www.livingreviews.org/), December 199

Construction, Concentration, and (Dis)Continuities in Social Valuations

I review and integrate recent sociological research that makes progress on three interrelated questions pertaining to social valuation: (a) the degree of social construction relative to objective constraints; (b) the degree of concentration in social valuations at a single point in time; and (c) the conditions that govern two broad forms of temporal discontinuity—(i) fashion cycles, especially in cultural expression and in managerial practices, and (ii) bubble/crash dynamics, as witnessed in such domains as authoritarian regimes and financial markets. In the course of the review, I argue for the importance of identifying how objective conditions constrain social construction and suggest two contrarian mechanisms by which this is accomplished—valuation opportunism and valuation entrepreneurship—and the conditions under which they are more or less effective

A Measurement of Rb using a Double Tagging Method

The fraction of Z to bbbar events in hadronic Z decays has been measured by the OPAL experiment using the data collected at LEP between 1992 and 1995. The Z to bbbar decays were tagged using displaced secondary vertices, and high momentum electrons and muons. Systematic uncertainties were reduced by measuring the b-tagging efficiency using a double tagging technique. Efficiency correlations between opposite hemispheres of an event are small, and are well understood through comparisons between real and simulated data samples. A value of Rb = 0.2178 +- 0.0011 +- 0.0013 was obtained, where the first error is statistical and the second systematic. The uncertainty on Rc, the fraction of Z to ccbar events in hadronic Z decays, is not included in the errors. The dependence on Rc is Delta(Rb)/Rb = -0.056*Delta(Rc)/Rc where Delta(Rc) is the deviation of Rc from the value 0.172 predicted by the Standard Model. The result for Rb agrees with the value of 0.2155 +- 0.0003 predicted by the Standard Model.Comment: 42 pages, LaTeX, 14 eps figures included, submitted to European Physical Journal

Measurement of the B+ and B-0 lifetimes and search for CP(T) violation using reconstructed secondary vertices

The lifetimes of the B+ and B-0 mesons, and their ratio, have been measured in the OPAL experiment using 2.4 million hadronic Z(0) decays recorded at LEP. Z(0) --> b (b) over bar decays were tagged using displaced secondary vertices and high momentum electrons and muons. The lifetimes were then measured using well-reconstructed charged and neutral secondary vertices selected in this tagged data sample. The results aretau(B+) = 1.643 +/- 0.037 +/- 0.025 pstau(Bo) = 1.523 +/- 0.057 +/- 0.053 pstau(B+)/tau(Bo) = 1.079 +/- 0.064 +/- 0.041,where in each case the first error is statistical and the second systematic.A larger data sample of 3.1 million hadronic Z(o) decays has been used to search for CP and CPT violating effects by comparison of inclusive b and (b) over bar hadron decays, No evidence fur such effects is seen. The CP violation parameter Re(epsilon(B)) is measured to be Re(epsilon(B)) = 0.001 +/- 0.014 +/- 0.003and the fractional difference between b and (b) over bar hadron lifetimes is measured to(Delta tau/tau)(b) = tau(b hadron) - tau((b) over bar hadron)/tau(average) = -0.001 +/- 0.012 +/- 0.008

Measurements of neutrino oscillation in appearance and disappearance channels by the T2K experiment with 6.6 x 10(20) protons on target

111 pages, 45 figures, submitted to Physical Review D. Minor revisions to text following referee comments111 pages, 45 figures, submitted to Physical Review D. Minor revisions to text following referee comments111 pages, 45 figures, submitted to Physical Review D. Minor revisions to text following referee commentsWe thank the J-PARC staff for superb accelerator performance and the CERN NA61/SHINE Collaboration for providing valuable particle production data. We acknowledge the support of MEXT, Japan; NSERC, NRC, and CFI, Canada; CEA and CNRS/IN2P3, France; DFG, Germany; INFN, Italy; National Science Centre (NCN), Poland; RSF, RFBR and MES, Russia; MINECO and ERDF funds, Spain; SNSF and SER, Switzerland; STFC, UK; and the U. S. Deparment of Energy, USA. We also thank CERN for the UA1/NOMAD magnet, DESY for the HERA-B magnet mover system, NII for SINET4, the WestGrid and SciNet consortia in Compute Canada, GridPP, UK, and the Emerald High Performance Computing facility in the Centre for Innovation, UK. In addition, participation of individual researchers and institutions has been further supported by funds from ERC (FP7), EU; JSPS, Japan; Royal Society, UK; and DOE Early Career program, USA

The Expanding Fireball of Nova Delphini 2013

A classical nova occurs when material accreting onto the surface of a white dwarf in a close binary system ignites in a thermonuclear runaway. Complex structures observed in the ejecta at late stages could result from interactions with the companion during the common envelope phase. Alternatively, the explosion could be intrinsically bipolar, resulting from a localized ignition on the surface of the white dwarf or as a consequence of rotational distortion. Studying the structure of novae during the earliest phases is challenging because of the high spatial resolution needed to measure their small sizes. Here we report near-infrared interferometric measurements of the angular size of Nova Delphini 2013, starting from one day after the explosion and continuing with extensive time coverage during the first 43 days. Changes in the apparent expansion rate can be explained by an explosion model consisting of an optically thick core surrounded by a diffuse envelope. The optical depth of the ejected material changes as it expands. We detect an ellipticity in the light distribution, suggesting a prolate or bipolar structure that develops as early as the second day. Combining the angular expansion rate with radial velocity measurements, we derive a geometric distance to the nova of 4.54 +/- 0.59 kpc from the Sun.Comment: Published in Nature. 32 pages. Final version available at http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v515/n7526/full/nature13834.htm

Measurement of the inclusive and dijet cross-sections of b-jets in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The inclusive and dijet production cross-sections have been measured for jets containing b-hadrons (b-jets) in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of sqrt(s) = 7 TeV, using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements use data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 34 pb^-1. The b-jets are identified using either a lifetime-based method, where secondary decay vertices of b-hadrons in jets are reconstructed using information from the tracking detectors, or a muon-based method where the presence of a muon is used to identify semileptonic decays of b-hadrons inside jets. The inclusive b-jet cross-section is measured as a function of transverse momentum in the range 20 < pT < 400 GeV and rapidity in the range |y| < 2.1. The bbbar-dijet cross-section is measured as a function of the dijet invariant mass in the range 110 < m_jj < 760 GeV, the azimuthal angle difference between the two jets and the angular variable chi in two dijet mass regions. The results are compared with next-to-leading-order QCD predictions. Good agreement is observed between the measured cross-sections and the predictions obtained using POWHEG + Pythia. MC@NLO + Herwig shows good agreement with the measured bbbar-dijet cross-section. However, it does not reproduce the measured inclusive cross-section well, particularly for central b-jets with large transverse momenta.Comment: 10 pages plus author list (21 pages total), 8 figures, 1 table, final version published in European Physical Journal